Total Control / Full Discipline

A school in North London, not far from Hampstead, placed an advert (below) in a national newspaper magazine for a "sergeant major in the detention room" to enact full discipline on dissenting students.

The school state on their website that students may be put in detentions for "turning around in class, calling out or being late". Other punishable offences include "failing to listen attentively, behaving badly outside of school, failing to bring correct equipment, and failing to complete homework".

Who knows what would happen if a student were to, lets say, write a critical blog?

This, sadly, is the real advert from The Times Educational Supplement

Maybe they should have added that "this role isn't suited to anyone who doesn't fantasize about dominating children" or "who didn't radically misinterpret Matilda". It's almost laughable though, to see what supposedly counts as belief these days. It reads like 1980s advertising: do you believe in clean dishes every time? It's less belief and more dogmatism, and a dogmatism which is originates more from the self-conception a "Detention Director" would have than from any concern with what will actually turn children into "better people". It's also strange isn't it, that in the midst of mental health crisis, a school would actively denounce the role of "would-be counsellor[s]", in a public forum no less?

Ah but it's so easy to forget. The adults know best.

DISCLAIMER: The advert in question originally appeared in the Times Education Supplement in January 2017.